Zebra Technologies Corporation (ZBRA)
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Citi’s 2026 Global TMT Conference

Sep 9, 2026

Summary

Physical AI, machine vision, and RFID are driving multi-year growth, with strong demand across retail and logistics. Strategic investments, proactive pricing, and internal AI adoption support margin expansion and operational efficiency. Robust execution and a diversified portfolio position the business for continued growth into 2027.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

We are starting bright and early with Zebra Technologies. We have Nathan Winters, who is the CFO. Welcome, Nathan.

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Great. It is great to be here.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

This is a tech conference, so let us start with the role Zebra plays in the technology ecosystem. There is a growing focus on physical AI and the next wave of automation investment. From your perspective, how do you view the investment cycle, and what does physical AI mean for Zebra specifically? Where do you see the company creating the most value as customers deploy more intelligent robots, automation systems, and connected assets across their operations?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Just to start, we look at physical AI and intelligent automation as a strong multi-year tailwind for the company. Because in any one of those environments, what they ultimately require is accurate real-time information to help guide those systems and provide the intelligence they need, and that is exactly what our portfolio of solutions performs today. If you look at asset visibility, at its core, it is giving an asset a digital voice so you can track it across the supply chain, whether that is a barcode, an RFID tag, or with a machine vision camera. Then we have the tools to help automate those workflows along the way. Again, whether that is enhancing how you scan a package, whether with RFID or doing visual inspection. Now in things with machine vision where we can be the sensing and intelligence for a robotic solution.

We have that with our Photoneo portfolio that is the eyes to a vision-guided robotic picker. Then translating that data back to the hands of a frontline worker with our mobile computing and now Elo portfolio kind of completes the flywheel of giving all the tools our customers need to help increase their ability to get that physical AI capabilities in the hands of their frontline workers. We are really excited about the opportunity that presents for us over the next couple of years.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Understood. Zebra continues to introduce AI-enabled applications across its portfolio, as you mentioned. Can you talk about the feedback you are getting from customers? Are customers seeing enough value from these solutions to give Zebra more pricing power and a competitive edge versus your peers? How would you characterize the adoption curve for some of the newer AI-enabled products that you have been bringing to the market?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Yeah. We are really encouraged by the momentum and the progress we have seen today around the AI suite of solutions. I think like many customers are trying to figure out, what is the right place? How do they deploy that technology? It starts with, do you have the right technology in the hands of those frontline workers to introduce those capabilities? In order to do that, you need the next generation of Mobile Computers. As customers are thinking about refreshing their portfolio, there is now a real trade-off on going to a lower-end device versus our now premium devices that have AI capabilities embedded on the device, RFID embedded. Now those are trade-offs you are thinking over the next three, five, seven years, I want those capabilities, so I can deploy the technology out in the front line.

I think that is where we are seeing the most value today is around those trade-offs, around the upgrade and going to the more premium device in their deployments. But if we look at the AI suite, think about the three layers. Enablers are just they come with a device. This is the APIs that allow our customers, independent third-party software providers, to easily create applications or agents on their own. You can go up the stack to a blueprint, which puts some of those enablers together and packages that in a way that we can monetize. Think of Picture Proof of Delivery for last mile delivery.

Now you have the lens of the camera, the optics on that dialed in so you can take a great picture of a door and a package, given the lighting around that, using optical character recognition to not only have a good picture from a did the package get delivered and help reduce the claims on the back end, but also completing some of those initial workflows that saves valuable seconds to that last mile delivery driver, to the full-blown companion of whether this is sales enablement, product development, or product enablement on the retail floor.

Again, customers are at varying stages of those deployments, but I think what everyone's looking at is, do I have the right technology and capabilities so that I can continue to advance that on that journey? We're helping our customers at various stages along the way. Again, we're excited about what that can bring and really thinking about how we can be that Frontline AI leader for our customers.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Understood. Zebra has a very diverse portfolio, and you mentioned a few things: machine vision, RFID, Mobile Computers, touch screens, and the Frontline AI Suite. As you look across your end markets today, which technologies are you most excited about based on the demand signals and trends you're seeing from customers? As a CFO, how are you prioritizing internal investments in your current portfolio?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

The good thing is we've seen strong demand across the portfolio today. You see that in our results quarter to date. Again, I think the entire portfolio is benefiting from some of the mega trends we see across the industries we serve. But I think a couple of technologies where you have the workflow with AI and our capabilities coming together that I think really are differentiated and are exciting. Machine vision and RFID are both, I think, two great examples of that. Again, closely adjacent technologies that really allow us to help automate different workflows that just weren't possible before in previous technologies in terms of understanding what's fresh in a produce section with RFID. I mean, that's a new capability and use case that quite frankly didn't exist a couple of years ago.

Continuing to invest in both those portfolios, expanding our go-to-market capabilities around both of those is a priority for the company. Also looking at our next generation Mobile Computer, obviously with the opportunity we have in front of us with enabling more Frontline workers with technology so they can take advantage of communication, collaboration, and now the benefits of AI is another top priority. The other one with the Elo acquisition, around touchscreen, Self-Service, Point of Sale. Again, we are seeing a lot of momentum there. The acquisition has been a great add to the portfolio and has been really performing well. Again, think about that as just another form of automating a Frontline workflow, just in a different form factor. That is where we prioritize our investments. Last year, we exited the robotics business.

I think that is just an example of reallocating capital and focus around those technologies where we see real differentiation and market opportunities over the next several years, along with just improving profitability by removing the loss leader.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

While we are on the topic of capital deployment, Zebra has historically been active on both M&A and strategic investments. Can you give us a sense of where you are focused today and what types of opportunities are most interesting to you? Are there specific technologies, capabilities, or adjacencies where you see a need to invest to further strengthen the portfolio and support the next phase of growth?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

I would start with saying our capital deployment strategy has been consistent, at least for the last five or so years, which is continue to invest organically. Just over 9% of our sales in R&D from an organic investment to continue to, again, accelerate our market leadership across the portfolio. Then being balanced between M&A opportunities and returning capital to shareholders. I think the last 12- 18 months have been a great example of that. While maintaining keeping our balance sheet at under 2x debt leverage and generating $1 billion of cash flow, so giving us plenty of flexibility to continue to invest here as we move forward. We really like the two acquisitions over the last year, for different reasons. One, Elo, an acquisition with size, scale, immediately accretive to earnings, and the opportunity to really drive meaningful synergies over the next couple of years.

That has been a great addition to the portfolio and has really been performing well. We also liked Photoneo, bringing in a niche, smaller company that can quickly attach to a larger business in machine vision, but brings unique capabilities around 3D machine vision, which again, gives us unique capabilities in the market, but easy to integrate on a relatively small scale. Like I said, the priority now the last nine months has been returning capital. We have repurchased just under $900 million over the last three quarters to take advantage of what we feel is a dislocated stock price. We are continuing to be active in the market today. Again, we think that has been the right balance of adding to the portfolio where it makes sense, and if not, continuing to return that capital to shareholders.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

On AI, how are you internalizing it across Zebra's own operations? R&D, as you mentioned, is a significant investment area. Are you seeing opportunities to drive greater efficiency and productivity through AI? It would be helpful if you could share some examples of how you are using AI internally. On the last earnings call, Bill talked about enhancing the go-to-market model. Can you elaborate on what you are doing there and how AI is helping improve sales and commercial execution?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

We think about it in three areas. One is, from an internal AI perspective, how do you accelerate innovation? How do you drive efficiency across it? How do you unlock new opportunities, particularly from a go-to-market and sales perspective? I think around the accelerating innovation, and driving efficiency at the same time, we are seeing some pretty good progress, from an R&D perspective around software development. Like many companies, we have a series of tools we are using across different aspects of the software development platform, and some nice momentum there. It is one of the reasons we are getting R&D as a percent of sales down closer to 9% as we go into 2027, without giving up any of the innovation in terms of time to market.

Then I would say on the operating and driving efficiency front, our service and repair teams have been using AI for a long time in terms of getting the right tools to our technical support folks, driving that efficiency across the repair operations and the response time to our customers. We are seeing great benefits on just internal IT development, and being able to quickly respond to needs of the business and turn those around from an IT perspective. Then on the go-to-market, a couple of things. One, using analytics around propensity to buy. So what customers have a more likely opportunity to buy based on the profile, the type of customer, the region. Partnering that with what we see from usage on our website, and that has been a really effective tool to help enable our sales team. Just basic marketing collateral.

So again, turnaround the time, language translation, those things have been a real game changer with AI technology. Then from a coverage perspective, a couple of things we've really invested in to highlight. One, a couple of years ago, we started to invest in inside sales, which was really a new capability for the company to give us breadth, along with be able to go deep in certain customers, particularly large manufacturers who tend to have a distributed buying behavior. So again, you need to be relationships at the local manufacturing leader. So again, using inside sales to go deeper and broader within accounts. And we're seeing that benefit now with resurgence of manufacturing, of having the coverage there to take advantage of that coverage now that the market's turned around.

And the other is we've continued to invest in direct sales capabilities for machine vision, RFID, and now AI. So again, coupling those overlay teams with our account managers where you need differentiated sales motion, different technical expertise to bring to market and take advantage of those opportunities.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Helpful. And going back to physical AI team, there are some concerns around the handheld category in warehouse environment. As AMRs, robotics, and potentially humanoids become more prevalent, some investors question whether the need for handheld devices could decline over time. Has that been an area of concern internally? And how are you thinking about the long-term role of handhelds in a more automated warehouse? More broadly, how does Zebra position itself and continue to create value as warehouses move more towards higher level of automation?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

I think it's important to start with what do we actually see in the market and what's happening from across the warehouse space today? Because we see both physical AI and the role of automation in the warehouse as an opportunity for the company. So I think that we think of it the opposite of a concern. It's an opportunity. And if you look at the legacy of the company, the legacy of the company is driving automation, driving efficiency. So that's not a new area for the company to invest in. But if you look today, despite the automation that's been invested in warehouses over the past five years, if you look at the amount of labor in a warehouse has continued to increase at a rate of 2%-3% per year, and that's expected over the next several coming years.

If you look at just warehouse capacity, that overall warehouse capacity and utilization has increased and is expected to grow at high single digits over the next several years. If you look, we've had external studies that look and said about 75% of warehouses today have very little form of automation. What customers are looking for is automation that's modular, flexible, has a quick ROI, as their needs change and adapt within a warehouse, and that's exactly what our solutions provide. Again, whether that's how you use RFID, machine vision, or a Ring Scanner, across those environments, that's the type of, again, quick, immediate return you can get with our technologies versus some of the others that you mentioned. Again, that's how we look at the opportunity.

I think the other one, which always is important to note, even in the worst case scenario, Mobile Computers in a warehouse environment represents 10%-15% of the company's revenue today. That doesn't account for in the world where there is fewer Mobile Computers, the offset of that is more vision systems that enable those robotic and automation systems to work, that we're going to benefit from. The example, Photoneo is a great example of that. Again, that's how we look at it and say there's such a huge opportunity to drive automation in the warehouse, that our technology is, that's where we're immediately focused along with how do we, again, continue to be the sensing technologies around those automation systems so that we can take advantage of both of those opportunities over the coming years.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

I'll ask one more question and then pause if there's any audience questions. Let's shift gears a bit. Can you give us your perspective on the assumptions that go into your guidance framework? You have previously described the current backdrop as more of a supply constraint than demand constraint environment. Do you have sufficient visibility into memory availability? If that gets you to the high end of your guidance range in 2026. Longer term, do you see upside to your 5%-7% growth algo, given the demand you see across your business today?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Yeah. Again, we're encouraged with the demand we see across the business. We had strong Q2 results, that enabled us to raise our full year guide for the year by three points, and be able to work through the supply constraints, and meet the underlying demand of our customers. So we feel good about the underlying performance of the business. Along with that, we raised our profitability both in terms of EBITDA rate, and EPS, by a half point once you exclude the IPA refund that we recovered in the second quarter. Again, strong results across the business. We're on track to fully mitigate the memory headwind from a dollar perspective, a bit ahead of pace in terms of what we're seeing in terms of price realization. So I think the business is really executing well.

As we said on the call, the midpoint of our guide really reflects a constrained view around demand. The high end of our guidance range, which is a point higher, reflects what we see as kind of really the underlying momentum and demand of the business if you look at our pipeline, backlog, conversion rates, et cetera. That is what the team is actively working on, which is not only securing that demand, and continuing to try to grow it, but also working with our suppliers, adding new suppliers for memory to increase the available capacity. Not just in the fourth quarter as we exit the year, but more importantly as we go into 2027 so that we can continue to meet the underlying growth in the market.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Any questions from the audience? I am getting you the mic.

Speaker 3

Nathan, maybe what are you doing differently to mitigate the memory chip headwinds versus the past? Because you obviously have done a much better job. I think, this time around. So what are you doing differently? Maybe second question is just competitive environment. If you look obviously, like one of your major competitors has sort of changed hands and stuff. So does that give you an advantage or how are you looking at that sort of change in the environment?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

On the memory front, I'd say three things. One, there's just a muscle you build up, unfortunately, as you go through the first and second round of tariffs, some of the semiconductor challenges back a few years ago. I think the muscle memory of the company just continues to improve in terms of how our, and our ability to respond and the capabilities we've built out over the last five years has put us in a better position. On the pricing front, one of the things we did differently this year is we announced the price increase that went into effect at the end of March, but we started pricing bids at the beginning of the year. We didn't wait for the price increase to take action. We were bidding projects well in advance of that.

I'd say the announcement and the timing of the pricing back in the first half of the year was important to notify the market, but we weren't waiting for that moment to start getting ahead of it, which has allowed us to, I realize, we raised our guidance from $60 million to $90 million in terms of price realization for the year because of, I think, the actions we took. I think the other is the team's done a great job of working proactively with the memory suppliers. We have direct relationships with the top three vendors so we're not buying on the spot market, actively working with them. No one likes the price, but I'd say they've delivered on their commitments in terms of when they've guaranteed. They've given us capacity commitments for the upcoming time periods, they've delivered on that.

That's what you can ask for from a partner while actively going out and qualifying multiple new suppliers. Just to give you a data point, historically, we may have had two to three different memory types per product. The goal by early part of next year is to have five-plus for every product. Again, just much more optionality. As capacity comes available in different pockets, we can take advantage of that with having multiple sources of memory available as we go into 2027. I think those are kind of the big three I think about, but that underlying one is I think just the muscle and the resiliency we've built out over the last few years enabled us to help navigate this current environment.

As I'd say, from a competitive standpoint, we haven't seen very much change in the market, day-to-day, in terms of competitive perspective. Our focus has been and will continue to be controlling what we can, making sure that we deliver value to our customers, that we stay close to them around their strategy, their challenges, and that's what has enabled us to grow our market share over the past 5- 10 years, and that's what we've really stayed focused on versus what's changed in terms of ownership structure of any of our competitors.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Any other questions?

Speaker 4

Yeah. It's working? Maybe just a quick one. You mentioned earlier on about third-party research suggesting that there's still really low levels of automation. Maybe just a quick comment on how your customers are or where your customers are in that transition, and maybe whether the account managers that you speak of now who need to have more technical ability, is there incentivization programs in place for them to help transition your customers on the automation path?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Yeah. The question around where we see our customers in that automation journey in the warehouse, and it really runs the spectrum from obviously very sophisticated, highly automated environments, by the way, that still need a lot of machine vision cameras, inspection cameras. You still have inbound, outbound that require our technology. So even in those automated environments, there still are technology surrounds that in different pockets. But you can go to the other end of it, and I would say they're barely one step above pen and paper. So it's really helping the full spectrum, and we have specialists that can go in and do an assessment. But it sometimes just starts with the very basic.

Then we've done a lot of work internally to make sure that our warehouses show that capability so they can come visit our distribution center and see how we use RFID on pallets that come in from our suppliers so that we can instantaneously see what's on a pallet, match that with the bill of lading, and take it onto the rack without having to unbox and scan. Again, I think it's multidimensional, but it really runs the gamut in terms of where folks are at on that technology journey. I think that's the benefit of what we can bring, which is we're not beholden to anyone. So you can mobile computer with the Ring Scanner may be the right technology for you in that journey.

You may be ready to move on and how you can leverage RFID across different parts of that or utilize machine vision in certain workflows. Regardless of which one of those technologies you want to use, we can offer and bring that in versus being kind of bespoke player in any one of those individual technologies. I think that's a real differentiator we can bring versus many of our competitors in that space.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Any other questions?

Speaker 4

I think you've done a good job managing and sustaining margins, and we have discussed some of the drivers, including mix improvement, AI-enabled offerings, restructuring actions. With the understanding that higher memory cost remains a near-term headwind, do you still see incremental opportunities to expand both gross and operating margins from here? As you look longer term, is it reasonable to think that this business can achieve mid-20s EBITDA margins over time?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

We absolutely believe, over the long term, mid-20s from an EBITDA rate perspective is achievable. If you look at just the structure of the business, the capital-light nature of how we operate with our partners, both from a supply and distribution perspective. Our long-term algorithm of growing 5%-7% on the top line should deliver a half a point of EBITDA rate expansion on an annual basis. Now, in the midst of all that, you have short-term headwinds, whether that's tariffs or memory. In this case, mix will be a driver on any given quarter year-on-year. Long term, we still see tremendous opportunities to expand margin, scaling our infrastructure, which is a real driver in that, while we also move to those solutions that have a higher inherent gross margin, whether that's machine vision, software, and AI as that expands across the portfolio.

We think, again, there's tremendous opportunity as we go. Obviously, in the short term from a rate perspective, we're working through the memory challenges. We'll get past that here over the next couple of years, and then we'll again continue on. Even with that pressure this year, we've been able to expand margins. I think that's the legacy of the company, and something we're absolutely focused on every day.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Now, on machine vision, you talked about it being a contributor to both growth and margins, but there is also a narrative that higher intelligence at the camera level has been an important differentiator. At the same time, some argue that AI could be disruptive with lower-cost cameras and open AI models potentially lowering the barriers to entry. Do you view that as a threat to the machine vision business, or do you think AI ultimately strengthens Zebra's competitive position in the market?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Yeah, we see AI and the capabilities around AI as a net positive and differentiator. I think first, if you look at anything that allows the technology to be easier deployed, and from a user perspective, easier, that's net positive for our customers and obviously the industry. By the way, we're having tremendous growth in machine vision this year, really around the strengths of manufacturing, benefiting from what's going on from a semiconductor perspective with our Matrox business and a lot of the work we've done over the last several years to win proof of concepts, get designed in, and now you have some market tailwind really helping drive the growth of that business. But we look at and say one of the barriers to entry around machine vision is that it is integrally designed into critical parts of your supply chain, where accuracy latency really matter.

Both from a quality perspective or if there's an issue that shuts down a production line, that comes at a tremendous cost. So having an open AI model with a cheap camera, you're putting a lot of trust in something that is so critical to your operation. Where we see pairing those AI models with, think of traditional vision-based architecture as a backstop is the right model to go. Where you get the efficiencies and benefits from AI, which we're deploying within our systems from the speed and accuracy perspective, but grounded in that vision-based architecture, that gives you the right liability and the quality you need in such critical operations.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Helpful. Growth has remained resilient for Zebra, and it seems we are still in the early stages of a broader device refresh cycle. Can you talk about your visibility into some of these larger refresh projects and how you're thinking about the opportunity over the next few years? Historically, these projects have carried a lower gross margin profile, but as you embed more AI capabilities and software into the portfolio, do you think Zebra has greater pricing power today and a better ability to capture value from these deployments? I understand I asked 12 questions in one.

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Yeah. Try to answer all those. I think there is clearly an opportunity from a refresh perspective we see over the next couple of years, particularly in our T&L segment. But if I take a step back, what is interesting is the company never really talked about a refresh cycle prior to the pandemic in 2021. Customers just always had a different cycle, whether that is a budgetary perspective, what was going on operationally.

So this idea that there are these once every X number of year events only really happened in 2021 because of the pandemic and the need in such a short period of time to not only refresh your technology but expand the footprint to meet the unique needs coming out of the pandemic, that created the narrative around a refresh cycle. If I look at our retail business, we are, I would say, in a normal refresh cycle, meaning that started back in 2024.

So every quarter, every year, different customers are refreshing at different times. That is great for our business. We are not waiting for this moment in front-of-store retail. It is ongoing and has been for the last couple of years. But the one we have not seen get back into that normal cycle is think of last-mile delivery in our T&L segment. So these are your postal carrier, your e-commerce drivers, and that is a very large install base. Those devices were primarily all rolled out in 2021 and 2022. I think we are at a unique moment where not only the devices are getting in their normal life cycle time to refresh, but an opportunity where now you can bring real unique AI capabilities to those last-mile delivery drivers.

Picture Proof of Delivery is a great example of that. So where we have seen, I would say, the differentiation on pricing and the premium product is what is really preventing a customer to look at it and say, maybe they were thinking, I would go to a lower-tier device just from a cost perspective, but if you choose that today, you are giving up those AI capabilities that you want to utilize for the next five-plus years. Now all our devices have RFID embedded, enabled on the device. So now if you have invested in RFID across your warehouse infrastructure, like many T&L providers have, and you go, how do I take advantage of that on that last mile? That is what our devices enable today.

Again, real differentiation, I think, from what our competitors kind of offer. Also thinking about where that value proposition is across our portfolio of products, I think is where we see the real differentiator on price. But again, we think that that T&L opportunity over the next several years is an absolutely great environment to continue to drive sustained growth and drive value. I would say in a quarter, yes, there is absolutely pressure from a margin perspective around large projects, as you would expect, just from a buying power and competitive nature of those products. But they are all profitable.

They are all EBITDA accretive. So I think it is great business. You saw the benefit of that in 2021 and 2022 when there was significant amount of large deals. But it was one of our largest years in terms of EBITDA rate in the company. I think that's where we really look at the opportunity as we go forward.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

As these commodity headwinds gradually normalize, would you expect some of the pricing actions you have taken to remain sticky? More broadly, do you think the current environment creates an opportunity for Zebra to retain a portion of these pricing gains and support margin even as component costs and supply conditions improve?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Look, if you look back, just given our technology, typically there is deflation. That's always the game of driving continual deflation across your bill of material, and across your supply base while protecting your price as much as possible. That's the muscle and what we do every day. I think given the unique nature of this, we'll have to see how it plays out because it's such a unique moment in terms of the inflationary pressure around memory and we're being transparent with our customers to the best we can around what that means to us, what that means to the cost of the device, why the price increases are what they are. I would expect they'd expect the same level of transparency on the way back.

Now, at the end of the day, would I rewind this year and would I rather lose $90 million of price but get back $120 million of cost and net be $30 million better off in EPS? I'd take it. I think again, if we can get back to the long term of driving deflation across our product, we can manage any type of price degradation because that's always been embedded in our long-term growth algorithm. I think we'll manage that when we get there. Like always, it's dissected at where we are from a competitive position, maintaining our premium in the market, while driving continued share gain, and we'll balance all those as we look at pricing moving forward.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Helpful. On the earnings call, you sounded broadly constructive on retail, e-commerce, and convenience stores. The macro backdrop and consumer sentiment remains a bit dynamic. From your conversations with customers in those end markets, what are you hearing about spending priorities and CapEx plans? Do you feel customers remain willing to invest, or do you see any signs of caution emerging as they think about the balance of the year?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

We saw strong demand in our retail and e-commerce business, grew double digit in the second quarter. We see that momentum continuing here through the back half of the year. Again, where they're deploying technology around equipping more frontline workers with technology to, again, as I mentioned earlier, take advantage of collaboration, communication. Now with the AI-powered devices, the only way you get the real full benefit of that is obviously having your workers being able to tap into that on a regular basis with their own device. We're also seeing continued to invest in fulfillments, right? Think back to the warehouse conversation. Within that retail and e-commerce, includes massive fulfillment operations as, again, as us as consumers want, demand visibility every step of the way as our product's delivered to our front doorstep, and how they can fulfill that in a most efficient way possible.

We're seeing a continued theme around, I mentioned earlier, Self-Service, Point of Sale, again, to drive that different form of automation and touch around their frontline retail. I'd say customers are continuing to invest, despite what you see in terms of narrative around the state of the consumer. If you listen to what they're saying is they need to invest to differentiate themselves in the market, from their competition, drive efficiency across their business, and provide that better experience for their consumers and their customers. That's what we absolutely see them today. Again, in the short term, around the pricing actions we've taken on memory, they're seeing it from multiple fronts as well. It's somewhat different than tariffs. Tariffs you had, depending on where you manufactured and what the rate was, you had different variability.

To some extent with memory, we're all in the same boat in terms of everyone, there's nowhere to hide from those price increases, long term from a memory front. They're seeing it from our competition, they're seeing it from other vendors, from a technology perspective. It's never a fun conversation to have. But one that I think you can have a good dialogue around the market dynamics and what you're trying to accomplish as a business and as a partner with them.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

In the last 30 seconds, do you have any messaging you would like to leave the investors with?

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Yeah, I think just a few takeaways, from what we're seeing as a business. One, we continue to believe we're at the center of some long-term durable growth trends. That ultimately reside in our customers needing to digitize and automate their environments, we see as a secular tailwind for the business. Our broad portfolio allows us to really take advantage of the AI opportunity in front of us and deliver those capabilities to our customers. We're seeing strong execution across our business momentum. Here in 2026, it gives us confidence not only as we exit the year, but as we go into 2027. So thanks for the time.

Piyush Avasthy
Analyst, Citi

Thanks, Nathan.

Nathan Winters
CFO, Zebra Technologies

Appreciate it.